The Jesuit parish of the Sacred Heart, Wimbledon is hosting a lecture by Pro. Tina Beattie to be delivered to the parish’s Newman Circle on January 23rd. The Sacred Heart parish is not far from the residence of the Papal Nuncio, Archbishop Mennini and is within the Archdiocese of Southwark.

It is significant that in the week after the announcement that the Soho Masses are being transferred to the Jesuit church of Farm Street, that members of the same Jesuit community have invited such a notorious supporter of same-sex marriage to speak at their parish in Wimbledon.

The Sacred Heart’s weekly newsletter announces:

“NEWMAN CIRCLE WEDNESDAY 23 JANUARY at 7.30 pm in the Lounge. Dr Tina Beattie will be speaking on ‘As Mary goes, so goes the Church’. All are welcome.”

These invitations to Prof. Beattie to speak in Catholic parishes follow her being banned from delivering a lecture in her own diocese of Clifton, and her fellowship being withdrawn from San Diego university because of her public support as a Catholic theologian of same-sex marriage in open defiance of the position taken by the Bishops Conference of England and Wales, and the Holy See.

Prof. Beattie, along with others, wrote to The Times on 13 August to state that “it is perfectly proper for Catholics, using fully informed consciences, to support the legal extension of civil marriage to same-sex couples”, and who equally scandalously quoted Cardinal Basil Hume, the late Cardinal Archbishop of Westminster, in a way which suggested he might have supported their case. They used words from his 1997 document, ‘A Note on the Teaching of the Catholic Church Concerning Homosexuality’: “love between two persons, whether of the same sex, or of a different sex, is to be treasured and respected” whilst omitting to mention that he went on to say that “the Church does not approve of homosexual genital acts” and “homosexual genital acts … are morally wrong”.

Prof. Tina Beattie imagines the apostles and women disciples having sex in her meditation The Last Supper According to Martha and Mary (2001) which the publishers describe as ‘part fiction, part Biblical reflection’.

Dr Tina Beattie is a director of and regular contributor to The Tablet which in its issue for Saturday 12 January published a version of Dr Beattie’s lecture on Mary.

Protect the Pope comment: It is significant that in the week after the announcement that the Soho Masses are being transferred to the Jesuit church of Farm Street, that members of the same Jesuit community have invited such a notorious supporters of same-sex marriage to speak at their parish in Wimbledon.

We should recall the words of Pope Benedict XVI to the English and Welsh bishops during their ad limina visit to Rome in February 2010: “it is important to recognise dissent for what it is, and not to mistake it for a mature contribution to a balanced and wide-ranging debate. It is the truth revealed through Scripture and Tradition and articulated by the Church’s Magisterium that sets us free.” Very few doubt that Pope Benedict had The Tablet and many of its contributors in mind when he uttered those words.

The Church in England and Wales is now entering a period of intense public conflict with David Cameron’s coalition government over its intention to legislate for “gay marriage”. And yet, a renowned parish run by the Jesuits (whose special charism is a vow of obedience to the Holy Father) has chosen to host a public lecture by a Catholic theologian who publicly supports same-sex marriage.

Please pray to Blessed John Henry Newman so that this lecture may be cancelled and that no further invitations to speak are extended to Prof. Beattie by the dioceses and parishes of the Catholic Church.

Protect the Pope asks anyone who is a parishioner of Sacred Heart Church, Wimbledon or lives within the Archdiocese of Southwark to write and/or e mail urgently with a respectful request that the lecture be cancelled to :

19 comments to Last week Jesuits put in charge of Soho Masses, next week Jesuits host Beattie lecture at Wimbledon

I am just wondering if there is a new trend here. Sister Gemma Symonds was at my parish only last week giving a nonsense talk in which she broght forth the new teaching on the `authority of life experience`. I am sorry to say that many of the parishioners lapped it up like a cat with milk on a plate. Having failed with informed catholics are they reching out for the ill-infomed.

It reminds me of something I read by ‘Catholic’ theologian Lisa Sowle Cahill. She wrote about the authority of Scripture, Tradition and experience (with the significant omission, I thought, of Magisterium).

I think it probably has something to do with the subversion of sound Thomist philosophy by “Transcendental Thomism” – a bastardized form of Thomism which took as its starting point Kantian assumptions and tried to escape from them to realism – but failed, leaving its adherents and various philosophical and theological offshoots effectively in hoc to non-realist philosphy – a disaster. The big names in this area are Marechal, Rahner, Lonergan – NB all Jesuits.

True love as in that love where we put the good of the other before ourselves has nothing to do with sexual relationship, mental or physical between two persons of the same sex, something which is intrinsically evil. The Jesuits should be suppressed. My son attends a Jesuit school and it has done its damnedest to strip him of his Faith. Those who have not got a good education and formation in the Faith at home generally come out of the school well-formed atheists, with a baseless, relativistic “morality”.

Well why don’t we invite the Jesuits to explain their debates with both the homosexuals/lesbians, I refuse to call them gay as I don’t find they are particularly happy
or alive, and I refuse to abuse the English language for the sake of particular ‘preferences’ or ‘choices’!
Perhaps the Jesuits have good reasons for discussions with Tina Beattie and homosexuals/lesbians.
It doesn’t seem to me to be very helpful or productive simply to react or deride them until we have understood their interests and activities. In order to understand the Jesuits we need them to explain themselves to us as equally interested parties. So Deacon Nick why don’t we invite a Jesuit to give us an account of their interest in those who dissent from Church teaching? We will all be much wiser after such an event.

I don’t understand the modern Jesuits. Fr Gerry Hughes SJ was a very kind man to my family. His books and talks eg ” God of surprises” have helped people. However I don’t understand why they are anti- conservativeness/tradition.

I’m very much enjoying The Spiritual Exercises by their founder St Ignatius Loyola. Why don’t they go back to basics instead of trying to be relevant?

Thanks Jackie, the Spiritual Exercises of St Ignatius Loyola have had a profound effect on me and my own conversion. I, too, find it incomprehensible that some Jesuits appear to reject loyalty to the pope Deacon Nick

As a matter of interest, I seem to remember reading recently that the Jesuits are in the process of handing the Sacred Heart Church and parish, back to the Southwark Diocese, as they no longer have sufficient priests to spare to run it.
I understood this change to be imminent, but I may be wrong. Whether this has anything to do with this proposed talk, I wouldn’t know.

This is all so very sad. I owe so much to a truly faithful Jesuit I met many years ago, Fr Thomas Murphy RIP, who was based at Sacred Heart, Wimbledon for a while. I went there to see him often and have to say I’m not surprised they are inviting Beattie. Fr Tom Murphy is buried in Morden cemetery. (Anyone out there remember him?) He, like Fr Thwaites, deeply lamented what the Jesuits had become.
Regarding Beattie – was anyone aware that she is also a proponent of women priests as well? She was quoted in one of John Wijngaard’s WomenPriests leaflets, giving the ’cause’ of women priests a resounding endorsement. And if she denies that one, I still have the leaflet.

What is wrong wit the Jesuits,their founder must be turning in his grave
I have also be told by a reliable source that at Farm St one of the priests has been changing the wording of the Missal so as to make it more friendly